- Twenty red-browed amazons were released in January 2025 in a forest reserve in Alagoas, Brazil, where only four wild individuals remained after the species was driven to near-extinction by illegal trade and deforestation.
- The ARCA project aims to restore ecological processes in the Atlantic Rainforest, which today covers just 3% of its historical range in Alagoas — the result, in part, of the loss of seed-dispersing animals.
- The Public Prosecutor’s Office of Alagoas shifted from reactive to preventive environmental protection in 2017, facilitating partnerships between scientists and private land owners to create a network of private reserves covering more than 5,000 hectares (12,400 acres).
- Between 2010 and 2020, Brazil’s Atlantic Forest lost an area the size of Washington, D.C., in mature trees each year, despite federal protection laws.
Twenty brilliantly colored red-browed amazons took flight over a reserve holding one of the few remaining intact swaths of Atlantic Forest in Brazil. The green-and-red parrots had been missing from Alagoas state for generations. In January 2025, the birds returned home.
Researchers say releasing the red-browed amazons (Amazona rhodocorytha) will help the species rebound and restore a dying ecosystem. Only 3% of the Atlantic Forest remains in Alagoas, according to Luiz Fábio Silveira, deputy director of the University of São Paulo’s Museum of Zoology, making it one of the most threatened ecosystems on Earth.
The Atlantic Forest fragments in Alagoas are failing because the animals that spread seeds have disappeared. According to Silveira, without these creatures, trees that depend on animals to spread their seeds are dying and being replaced by trees whose seeds travel on the wind.
The release into a thousand-hectare forest reserve in Coruripe, outside of the state capital, Maceió, is part of the Project for the Evaluation, Recovery and Conservation of Endangered Birds (ARCA), which Silveira leads.
“It’s not just the animals, but their sounds that are returning to the forest,” Silveira told Mongabay, describing videos sent by community monitors showing flocks of red-browed amazons flying through the reserve.
Resembling large lovebirds, red-browed amazons were once common enough to be among the first birds recorded when the first Europeans made landfall in what is today Brazil, in the year 1500. More than half a millennium later, by December 2024, researchers counted just four wild red-browed amazons in all of Alagoas state, Silveira reported.
The birds were pushed to near-extinction by “the synergy between capturing the last birds for illegal trade and severe deforestation in the remaining forests,” Silveira said, “which led to a lack of places for nesting and feeding.”
The release earlier this year took place in a forest reserve in the municipality of Coruripe that’s owned by sugarcane company Usina Coruripe and recognized as a Biosphere Reserve by the Brazilian government. It represents one of the best-protected sites in the state, according to Silveira.
The reserve also holds the largest population of brazilwood (Paubrasilia echinata), the tree that gave Brazil its name, outside of Bahia state. Yet even in this protected area, without seed-spreading animals, the natural processes that maintain forest health have broken down.
The 20 parrots released in January came from rescue centers and a conservation foundation. None had lived in the wild before, so they spent two years in a large aviary within the forest, learning to recognize natural foods and to adjust to rainfall patterns.
The birds went through behavioral tests to assess their social skills, general behavior and fear of new things, Silveira said. Ten birds failed these tests and remain in captivity for breeding.
The released parrots are all young and won’t be old enough to breed until they’re aged 5-8 years, according to Silveira. That means the first chicks born in the wild will probably come in 2027.
Watching over the released birds has its challenges, Silveira said. The main danger is that they fly beyond the forest and get lost. Adult parrots face little risk from predators, but birds in nests remain vulnerable, he said.
A team of sugar mill employees, chosen by Silveira for their care for nature, monitors the birds daily and sends video updates twice each day.
The ARCA project began in 2018 with support from the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP), creating a new approach to forest conservation in Alagoas.
The partnership emerged after the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Alagoas established a program to conserve endangered species in 2017. Prosecutor Alberto Fonseca said the office wanted to move away from simply reacting to environmental damage after it had occurred.
“The high degree of environmental degradation, especially in the Atlantic Forest biome in Alagoas, has imposed the need for a paradigm shift,” Fonseca wrote in an email to Mongabay. The new approach, he said, “values and prioritizes preventive actions.”
Since most forest fragments are privately owned by sugar and alcohol mills and are too small for the government to designate as national parks, the researchers worked with the Public Prosecutor’s Office and local groups to convert these areas into Private Natural Heritage Reserves (RPPNs), according to Silveira.
After persuading notary offices to waive registration fees that typically range in the thousands of dollars for establishing an RPPN, the project has protected more than 5,000 hectares (about 12,400 acres) of Atlantic Forest in Alagoas, Silveira said.
Despite ongoing threats from deforestation, hunting and the illegal bird trade, “it is encouraging to see sectors such as the sugarcane industry, tourism, academia, and governmental and non-governmental organizations united in the creation of protected areas,” Fonseca wrote.
In addition to the red-browed amazons, other species restoration projects are underway here, including for the Alagoas curassow (Mitu mitu), a turkey-sized bird that’s been declared extinct in the wild for the past 30 years; it was reintroduced here from a captive population in 2019. The reserve also hosts reintroduced populations of the solitary tinamou (Tinamus solitarius), a ground-dwelling bird, and the red-footed tortoise (Chelonoidis carbonarius).
The project has sparked public enthusiasm. The Alagoas curassow became the official state bird, inspiring carnival celebrations, street races and murals, according to Silveira.
The reintroductions running on a budget of $500,000 per year, with the money coming from FAPESP, BluestOne, Usina Coruripe, the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) and private donors, according to Silveira.
“The population is beginning to have these animals back in their daily lives, and they’re starting to feel a great pride in their return,” Silveira said. “The residents of these regions, instead of wanting these animals in their homes [as pets], prefer to see them in the wild.”
The Atlantic Forest faces pressure across Brazil. Between 2010 and 2020, the forest lost an area the size of Washington, D.C., in mature trees each year, despite federal protection laws. Most of this deforestation happened illegally on private lands cleared for agriculture.
Agriculture and livestock farming drive most of the loss, with major agribusiness companies including COFCO, Bunge and Cargill linked to Atlantic Forest destruction in their soybean supply chains.
The range once covered by the forest is home to three-quarters of Brazil’s population, including the mega cities of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, and accounts for 70% of the country’s GDP.
For Fonseca, there’s a broader significance to the work of restoring the biome: “Despite having lost more than 90% of its original coverage, millions of Brazilians use water from sources originating in the Atlantic Forest biome.”
For now, the restoration project in Alagoas has no planned end date. Reintroductions will continue until the wild populations can sustain themselves — a goal that remains years away, but grows closer with each flock of parrots returning to the forest canopy.
Banner image of a red-browed amazons (Amazona rhodocorytha) by Luiz Fábio Silveira.
Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay and holds a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Tulane University, where she studied the microbiomes of trees. View more of her reporting here.
Brazil’s Atlantic Forest still losing ‘large amounts’ of mature forest, despite legal protection
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